Syrian
President Bashar al-Assad says he is ‘not concerned’ about a draft
resolution submitted by the United States, France and the UK to the UN
Security Council to place Syrian chemical weapons under international
control.

On September 14, Russia and the United States agreed on a deal under
which Syria must account for its chemical weapons stockpiles within a
week and see them eliminated by the middle of 2014. Syria has agreed to
the deal.

Representatives from the five permanent members of the Security Council
- the US, Britain, France, Russia and China - met on September 19 for a
third day to discuss the draft resolution that is aimed to make the
deal legally binding.

The draft makes references to possible measures - sanctions and
military force - against the Syrian government under Article 7 of the UN
Charter. Russia has censured the West over the references.

“I am not concerned. Since its independence, Syria has been committed
to all the treaties it has signed. We will honor everything that we
have agreed to do,” President Assad was quoted by China’s CCTV on
Monday.

“And
more importantly, I want to say, by submitting the draft to the UN
Security Council, or by urging the US and Russia to agree on a deal,
the US, France, and Britain are just trying to make themselves winners
in a war against Syria which is their imaginary enemy,” Assad stated.

He said Syria keeps chemical weapons as it has been in a state of war,
with some of its land occupied for more than 40 years by the Israeli
regime.

“We are a nation at war, we’ve got territories that have been occupied
for more than 40 years, but in any case, the Syrian army is trained to
fight using conventional weapons,” the Syrian president said.

On August 21, the militants operating inside Syria and the
foreign-backed Syria opposition claimed that over a thousand people had
been killed in a government chemical attack on militant strongholds on
the outskirts of Damascus. Western powers intensified the rhetoric
afterward.

However, Damascus categorically rejects the allegation and says the
fatal attack was carried out by the militants to draw in foreign
intervention.

President Assad also stated that Syria’s chemical weapons are not
likely to fall into the hands of militants as they are “in a safe place
that is secure and under the control of the Syrian army.”

The Syrian president said it was likely that the militants could hinder
the access of chemical weapons inspectors to sites where the weapons
were stored and made.

“We know that these terrorists are obeying the orders of other
countries and these countries do drive these terrorists to commit acts
that could get the Syrian government blamed for hindering this
agreement.”

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